In ‘departure from trend’, mortality rate down in the same month

Anantnag: For every person who recovered from Covid-19 in the month of April, more than two other people were infected in the ten districts of Kashmir Division, with fresh cases this month having already breached the 15k mark.

The relief is that the death rate in the same time period has been way below the average death rate since the beginning of the pandemic here in Kashmir valley.

The total new cases recorded in Kashmir Division since April 1 till Friday, April 23, have been 15,128, with the highest daily number, of 1299 cases, on April 21.

“In these 23 days, meanwhile, 7,421 people have recovered from the infection in different parts of the valley,” a senior official privy to the data on Covid-19 told Kashmir Reader.

This essentially means that for every person who has recovered this month, 2.3 new people have been infected. “Or we can put it this way, that the recovery rate in Kashmir valley in the month of April has been only around 49 percent,” the official said.

This, when seen in comparison to the overall recovery rate since the beginning of the pandemic, is way too low. Right now the average recovery rate (82,312 recoveries among 93,508) is 88.4 percent.

“While this has come considerably down from around 97 percent in the beginning of March, the figures in the month of April are worrying. The recovery rate is only 49 percent,” the official said. “The bright spot, though, is that in the last few days the recoveries have increased — from only 78 on April 1 to 606 on April 19. There is indeed an upward trend. Let us keep our fingers crossed.”

Meanwhile another aspect that gives some hope amid this second wave has been the declining death rate in the ten districts of Kashmir valley. 54 people have died since April 1 in different parts of Kashmir, against more than 15k infections.

The death rate is only 0.35 percent since the beginning of April, while the average mortality rate in Kashmir since March last year has hovered between 1.4 and 1.6 percent.

“This is a marked departure from the trend and let us hope it continues,” the official said.

Meanwhile, the administration in the Union Territory has marked 23 hospitals across J&K as Covid hospitals. 15 of these hospitals are located in the Kashmir Division.

Suhail A Shah